By Nick Apostolidis, Global Development Leader, GHD
Australia has long been recognized as having one of the most variable climates on the planet. Contrary to popular perception, most of the overseas countries think we are doing a good job in managing such variability and look to our solutions and policies as being best practice. For example, the Americans think our security through diversity approach to water supply security is industry-leading. China believes our water management and allocation policies are best practice. Europeans see our demand management initiatives as being positioned well ahead of any other practice.
Having just returned from two international water conferences in Singapore and China, it is disappointing to see the good work we have recently done in Australia to improve our water security being ridiculed in the media as being wasteful because suddenly we have record rainfalls and our dams are full again.
Is the weather changing?
While we cannot accurately predict the future, data recorded over the past century indicates the climate is becoming warmer and as a result we can expect our weather to be more extreme. More rain has fallen in areas such as the east coast of North and South America and northern Europe since 1900 but less has fallen in the Mediterranean and parts of Africa and Asia. Since 1970, eastern and south-western Australia have become much dryer.
Weather patterns in the Pacific are also playing a role. A jump in El Niño (warming) events after 1977 brought drought in Australia but since 2008 La Niña (cooling) has returned with record rainfall and floods.
These trends suggest we can expect higher temperatures and more severe droughts but also more intense storms and coastal flooding throughout the world. Therefore, the challenges we had to face in Australia will be replicated in other parts of the world with traditionally more stable climates. Australia is a lucky country. We have the resources and talent to overcome such extreme events. Many countries around the world do not. You just have to look to East Africa to see the consequences of taking no action against climate variability.
Planning for climate variability
We cannot ‘climate proof’ our infrastructure. We can better understand the risks we face and plan for extreme events such as the millennium drought or the Queensland floods. The latter highlighted the importance of understanding the consequences of building in flood prone areas.
Having to cope with such variability poses many challenges for our governments. The investment needed is much greater than other countries with more stable and predictable weather patterns.
How do we build climate resilience into water infrastructure, transportation and energy networks, buildings and communication systems? In a variable climate environment, we have to have some climate independent sources of water such as desalination, but we can also push the boundaries in improving water use efficiency in agriculture and design our cities to be more resilient to this variability.
Land use planning, design and modelling all have roles to play as engineers, planners and architects go back to the drawing board and ask the hard questions. Is designing only for a one in 100-year flood appropriate? Should we consider building to category five cyclone conditions in coastal areas?
Limiting development in vulnerable areas is preferred, but not always realistic as most settlements were established near water, leaving them exposed to flood.
While levees, dykes or bunds can help protect existing assets, more modeling and mapping are needed to identify vulnerable areas and plan for new developments. A review of building codes and standards is also needed so that materials match the appropriate level of risk.
Minimising our exposure to climate risks will be ever more important as we push the boundaries of our built environment and plan for the future.
Whether we like it or not the world will have to deal with more extreme weather events. Many countries will look to Australia to solve their problems. In Australia we have the opportunity to grasp this leadership position and show pride in what we have achieved and help other countries deal with their variable climate or fall victim to short term thinking and sniping and de-value the great work that has been done.
First published in Civil Engineers Australia, January 2012. Kindly reprinted courtesy GHD.
About Nick: Appointed to the GHD Board in 2002, Nick brings more than 30 years’ international experience in consulting, in particular the water sector which he led for GHD over the past 10 years. Nick is a director of Water Australia and was recently appointed to the Board of the Australian Green Infrastructure Council. In his current role, Nick is responsible for the the further development of GHD’s global water business.
